The Parasite and Other Tales of Terror Arthur Conan Doyle 2 Full Chapter
The Parasite and Other Tales of Terror Arthur Conan Doyle 2 Full Chapter
The Parasite and Other Tales of Terror Arthur Conan Doyle 2 Full Chapter
The Parasite and Other Tales of Terror by Arthur Conan Doyle (2021)
Title Page
Copyright
Introduction
The Parasite
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Back Cover
This collection of stories by Arthur Conan Doyle is presented by the
Horror Writers Association, a nonprofit organization of writers and
publishing professionals around the world, dedicated to promoting
dark literature and the interests of those who write it.
For more information on HWA, visit: horror.org.
Introduction
A Beast That Has Tasted Blood
IF CONAN DOYLE had never produced a single word apart from the
Sherlock Holmes stories, he might still claim a place among
literature’s most celebrated horror writers. The Hound of the
Baskervilles, with its spectral hound and mysterious family curse,
ranks high among the world’s masterworks of Gothic terror—“a real
creeper,” as Conan Doyle himself described it.
But Conan Doyle’s talent and restless energy pushed out in many
directions, leading him to try his hand in several different genres,
and from his earliest days as an author he proved particularly adept
at tales of the macabre and supernatural. His love of storytelling, he
later explained, took root as a boy, while listening to his mother read
aloud to the family. “It is not only that she was a wonderful story-
teller,” he recalled, “but she had an art of sinking her voice to a
horror-stricken whisper when she came to a crisis in the narrative,
which makes me goose-fleshy now when I think of it. It was in
attempting to emulate these stories of my childhood that I began
weaving dreams myself.”
Conan Doyle also drew a powerful jolt of inspiration from Edgar
Allan Poe, whom he regarded as “the supreme original short story
writer of all time.” Poe’s Tales of Mystery and Imagination, in
particular, had been a favorite book of his boyhood. “I read it young
when my mind was plastic,” he recalled. “It stimulated my
imagination and set before me a supreme example of dignity and
force in the methods of telling a story.”
The stories collected here, some of which represent Conan Doyle’s
earliest appearances in print, demonstrate the degree to which
imaginative horror stories helped him find his voice as an author.
“The Mystery of Sasassa Valley,” a chilling ghost story set in South
Africa, was among his very earliest efforts, written when he was a
nineteen-year-old medical student. It appeared in Chambers’s
Journal in September of 1879, and earned him the princely sum of
three guineas. “After receiving that little cheque I was a beast that
has once tasted blood,” he would recall, “for I knew that whatever
rebuffs I might receive—and God knows I had plenty—I had once
proved I could earn gold, and the spirit was in me to do it again.”
The Parasite, the “mesmeric and hypnotic” novella that forms the
centerpiece of this collection, ranks among the most gripping and
distinctive stories that Conan Doyle ever wrote. Published in 1894,
The Parasite opens as a skeptic named Austin Gilroy reluctantly
attends a demonstration of mesmerism, a form of hypnotic “animal
magnetism” given by Helen Penclosa, a mysterious visitor from
Trinidad. By slow degrees, as Miss Penclosa exerts her strange and
malign power, Gilroy comes to regard her as a “monstrous parasite”
who has insinuated herself into his mind with potentially deadly
effect, as completely as the “hermit crab does into the whelk’s shell.”
Conan Doyle would later be dismissive of this story, relegating it to
a “very inferior plane” from the rest of his work, but it is worth
noting that he said much the same of Sherlock Holmes, whose
adventures he also considered to be “on a different and humbler
plane.” For modern readers, The Parasite and the other tales
collected here will come as a delightful surprise, showing Conan
Doyle at his most inventive, exploring novel ideas and challenging
themes that he likely considered too outré for his more conventional
work. The results are both startling and wildly entertaining. As
Austin Gilroy remarks in The Parasite, “What strange, deep waters
these are!”
Daniel Stashower
February 10, 2020
Bethesda, Maryland
The Parasite
Chapter I
MARCH 24. The spring is fairly with us now. Outside my laboratory
window the great chestnut-tree is all covered with the big, glutinous,
gummy buds, some of which have already begun to break into little
green shuttlecocks. As you walk down the lanes you are conscious of
the rich, silent forces of nature working all around you. The wet
earth smells fruitful and luscious. Green shoots are peeping out
everywhere. The twigs are stiff with their sap; and the moist, heavy
English air is laden with a faintly resinous perfume. Buds in the
hedges, lambs beneath them—everywhere the work of reproduction
going forward!
I can see it without, and I can feel it within. We also have our
spring when the little arterioles dilate, the lymph flows in a brisker
stream, the glands work harder, winnowing and straining. Every year
nature readjusts the whole machine. I can feel the ferment in my
blood at this very moment, and as the cool sunshine pours through
my window I could dance about in it like a gnat. So I should, only
that Charles Sadler would rush upstairs to know what was the
matter. Besides, I must remember that I am Professor Gilroy. An old
professor may afford to be natural, but when fortune has given one
of the first chairs in the university to a man of four-and-thirty he
must try and act the part consistently.
What a fellow Wilson is! If I could only throw the same enthusiasm
into physiology that he does into psychology, I should become a
Claude Bernard1 at the least. His whole life and soul and energy
work to one end. He drops to sleep collating his results of the past
day, and he wakes to plan his researches for the coming one. And
yet, outside the narrow circle who follow his proceedings, he gets so
little credit for it. Physiology is a recognized science. If I add even a
brick to the edifice, every one sees and applauds it. But Wilson is
trying to dig the foundations for a science of the future. His work is
underground and does not show. Yet he goes on uncomplainingly,
corresponding with a hundred semi-maniacs in the hope of finding
one reliable witness, sifting a hundred lies on the chance of gaining
one little speck of truth, collating old books, devouring new ones,
experimenting, lecturing, trying to light up in others the fiery interest
which is consuming him. I am filled with wonder and admiration
when I think of him, and yet, when he asks me to associate myself
with his researches, I am compelled to tell him that, in their present
state, they offer little attraction to a man who is devoted to exact
science. If he could show me something positive and objective, I
might then be tempted to approach the question from its
physiological side. So long as half his subjects are tainted with
charlatanerie and the other half with hysteria, we physiologists must
content ourselves with the body and leave the mind to our
descendants.
No doubt I am a materialist. Agatha says that I am a rank one. I
tell her that is an excellent reason for shortening our engagement,
since I am in such urgent need of her spirituality. And yet I may
claim to be a curious example of the effect of education upon
temperament, for by nature I am, unless I deceive myself, a highly
psychic man. I was a nervous, sensitive boy, a dreamer, a
somnambulist, full of impressions and intuitions. My black hair, my
dark eyes, my thin, olive face, my tapering fingers, are all
characteristic of my real temperament, and cause experts like Wilson
to claim me as their own. But my brain is soaked with exact
knowledge. I have trained myself to deal only with fact and with
proof. Surmise and fancy have no place in my scheme of thought.
Show me what I can see with my microscope, cut with my scalpel,
weigh in my balance, and I will devote a lifetime to its investigation.
But when you ask me to study feelings, impressions, suggestions,
you ask me to do what is distasteful and even demoralizing. A
departure from pure reason affects me like an evil smell or a musical
discord.
Which is a very sufficient reason why I am a little loath to go to
Professor Wilson’s to-night. Still I feel that I could hardly get out of
the invitation without positive rudeness; and, now that Mrs. Marden
and Agatha are going, of course I would not if I could. But I had
rather meet them anywhere else. I know that Wilson would draw me
into this nebulous semi-science of his if he could. In his enthusiasm
he is perfectly impervious to hints or remonstrances. Nothing short
of a positive quarrel will make him realize my aversion to the whole
business. I have no doubt that he has some new mesmerist or
clairvoyant or medium or trickster of some sort whom he is going to
exhibit to us, for even his entertainments bear upon his hobby. Well,
it will be a treat for Agatha, at any rate. She is interested in it, as
woman usually is in whatever is vague and mystical and indefinite.
10:50 p.m. This diary-keeping of mine is, I fancy, the outcome of
that scientific habit of mind about which I wrote this morning. I like
to register impressions while they are fresh. Once a day at least I
endeavor to define my own mental position. It is a useful piece of
self-analysis, and has, I fancy, a steadying effect upon the character.
Frankly, I must confess that my own needs what stiffening I can give
it. I fear that, after all, much of my neurotic temperament survives,
and that I am far from that cool, calm precision which characterizes
Murdoch or Pratt-Haldane. Otherwise, why should the tomfoolery
which I have witnessed this evening have set my nerves thrilling so
that even now I am all unstrung? My only comfort is that neither
Wilson nor Miss Penclosa nor even Agatha could have possibly
known my weakness.
And what in the world was there to excite me? Nothing, or so little
that it will seem ludicrous when I set it down.
The Mardens got to Wilson’s before me. In fact, I was one of the
last to arrive and found the room crowded. I had hardly time to say
a word to Mrs. Marden and to Agatha, who was looking charming in
white and pink, with glittering wheat-ears in her hair, when Wilson
came twitching at my sleeve.
“You want something positive, Gilroy,” said he, drawing me apart
into a corner. “My dear fellow, I have a phenomenon—a
phenomenon!”
I should have been more impressed had I not heard the same
before. His sanguine spirit turns every fire-fly into a star.
“No possible question about the bona fides this time,” said he, in
answer, perhaps, to some little gleam of amusement in my eyes. “My
wife has known her for many years. They both come from Trinidad,
you know. Miss Penclosa has only been in England a month or two,
and knows no one outside the university circle, but I assure you that
the things she has told us suffice in themselves to establish
clairvoyance upon an absolutely scientific basis. There is nothing like
her, amateur or professional. Come and be introduced!”
I like none of these mystery-mongers, but the amateur least of all.
With the paid performer you may pounce upon him and expose him
the instant that you have seen through his trick. He is there to
deceive you, and you are there to find him out. But what are you to
do with the friend of your host’s wife? Are you to turn on a light
suddenly and expose her slapping a surreptitious banjo? Or are you
to hurl cochineal2 over her evening frock when she steals round with
her phosphorus bottle and her supernatural platitude? There would
be a scene, and you would be looked upon as a brute. So you have
your choice of being that or a dupe. I was in no very good humor as
I followed Wilson to the lady.
Any one less like my idea of a West Indian could not be imagined.
She was a small, frail creature, well over forty, I should say, with a
pale, peaky face, and hair of a very light shade of chestnut. Her
presence was insignificant and her manner retiring. In any group of
ten women she would have been the last whom one would have
picked out. Her eyes were perhaps her most remarkable, and also, I
am compelled to say, her least pleasant, feature. They were grey in
color,—grey with a shade of green,—and their expression struck me
as being decidedly furtive. I wonder if furtive is the word, or should I
have said fierce? On second thoughts, feline would have expressed it
better. A crutch leaning against the wall told me what was painfully
evident when she rose: that one of her legs was crippled.
So I was introduced to Miss Penclosa, and it did not escape me
that as my name was mentioned she glanced across at Agatha.
Wilson had evidently been talking. And presently, no doubt, thought
I, she will inform me by occult means that I am engaged to a young
lady with wheat-ears in her hair. I wondered how much more Wilson
had been telling her about me.
“Professor Gilroy is a terrible sceptic,” said he; “I hope, Miss
Penclosa, that you will be able to convert him.”
She looked keenly up at me.
“Professor Gilroy is quite right to be sceptical if he has not seen
any thing convincing,” said she. “I should have thought,” she added,
“that you would yourself have been an excellent subject.”
“For what, may I ask?” said I.
“Well, for mesmerism, for example.”
“My experience has been that mesmerists go for their subjects to
those who are mentally unsound. All their results are vitiated, as it
seems to me, by the fact that they are dealing with abnormal
organisms.”
“Which of these ladies would you say possessed a normal
organism?” she asked. “I should like you to select the one who
seems to you to have the best balanced mind. Should we say the girl
in pink and white?—Miss Agatha Marden, I think the name is.”
“Yes, I should attach weight to any results from her.”
“I have never tried how far she is impressionable. Of course some
people respond much more rapidly than others. May I ask how far
your scepticism extends? I suppose that you admit the mesmeric
sleep and the power of suggestion.”
“I admit nothing, Miss Penclosa.”
“Dear me, I thought science had got further than that. Of course I
know nothing about the scientific side of it. I only know what I can
do. You see the girl in red, for example, over near the Japanese jar. I
shall will that she come across to us.”
She bent forward as she spoke and dropped her fan upon the floor.
The girl whisked round and came straight toward us, with an
enquiring look upon her face, as if some one had called her.
“What do you think of that, Gilroy?” cried Wilson, in a kind of
ecstasy.
I did not dare to tell him what I thought of it. To me it was the
most barefaced, shameless piece of imposture that I had ever
witnessed. The collusion and the signal had really been too obvious.
“Professor Gilroy is not satisfied,” said she, glancing up at me with
her strange little eyes. “My poor fan is to get the credit of that
experiment. Well, we must try something else. Miss Marden, would
you have any objection to my putting you off?”
“Oh, I should love it!” cried Agatha.
By this time all the company had gathered round us in a circle, the
shirt-fronted men, and the white-throated women, some awed,
some critical, as though it were something between a religious
ceremony and a conjurer’s entertainment. A red velvet arm-chair
had been pushed into the centre, and Agatha lay back in it, a little
flushed and trembling slightly from excitement. I could see it from
the vibration of the wheat-ears. Miss Penclosa rose from her seat
and stood over her, leaning upon her crutch.
And there was a change in the woman. She no longer seemed
small or insignificant. Twenty years were gone from her age. Her
eyes were shining, a tinge of color had come into her sallow cheeks,
her whole figure had expanded. So I have seen a dull-eyed, listless
lad change in an instant into briskness and life when given a task of
which he felt himself master. She looked down at Agatha with an
expression which I resented from the bottom of my soul—the
expression with which a Roman empress might have looked at her
kneeling slave. Then with a quick, commanding gesture she tossed
up her arms and swept them slowly down in front of her.
I was watching Agatha narrowly. During three passes she seemed
to be simply amused. At the fourth I observed a slight glazing of her
eyes, accompanied by some dilation of her pupils. At the sixth there
was a momentary rigor. At the seventh her lids began to droop. At
the tenth her eyes were closed, and her breathing was slower and
fuller than usual. I tried as I watched to preserve my scientific calm,
but a foolish, causeless agitation convulsed me. I trust that I hid it,
but I felt as a child feels in the dark. I could not have believed that I
was still open to such weakness.
“She is in the trance,” said Miss Penclosa.
“She is sleeping!” I cried.
“Wake her, then!”
I pulled her by the arm and shouted in her ear. She might have
been dead for all the impression that I could make. Her body was
there on the velvet chair. Her organs were acting—her heart, her
lungs. But her soul! It had slipped from beyond our ken. Whither
had it gone? What power had dispossessed it? I was puzzled and
disconcerted.
“So much for the mesmeric sleep,” said Miss Penclosa. “As regards
suggestion, whatever I may suggest Miss Marden will infallibly do,
whether it be now or after she has awakened from her trance. Do
you demand proof of it?”
“Certainly,” said I.
“You shall have it.” I saw a smile pass over her face, as though an
amusing thought had struck her. She stooped and whispered
earnestly into her subject’s ear. Agatha, who had been so deaf to
me, nodded her head as she listened.
“Awake!” cried Miss Penclosa, with a sharp tap of her crutch upon
the floor. The eyes opened, the glazing cleared slowly away, and the
soul looked out once more after its strange eclipse.
We went away early. Agatha was none the worse for her strange
excursion, but I was nervous and unstrung, unable to listen to or
answer the stream of comments which Wilson was pouring out for
my benefit. As I bade her good-night Miss Penclosa slipped a piece
of paper into my hand.
“Pray forgive me,” said she, “if I take means to overcome your
scepticism. Open this note at ten o’clock to-morrow morning. It is a
little private test.”
I can’t imagine what she means, but there is the note, and it shall
be opened as she directs. My head is aching, and I have written
enough for to-night. To-morrow I dare say that what seems so
inexplicable will take quite another complexion. I shall not surrender
my convictions without a struggle.
March 25. I am amazed, confounded. It is clear that I must
reconsider my opinion upon this matter. But first let me place on
record what has occurred.
I had finished breakfast, and was looking over some diagrams with
which my lecture is to be illustrated, when my housekeeper entered
to tell me that Agatha was in my study and wished to see me
immediately. I glanced at the clock and saw with sun rise that it was
only half-past nine.
When I entered the room, she was standing on the hearth-rug
facing me. Something in her pose chilled me and checked the words
which were rising to my lips. Her veil was half down, but I could see
that she was pale and that her expression was constrained.
“Austin,” she said, “I have come to tell you that our engagement is
at an end.”
I staggered. I believe that I literally did stagger. I know that I
found myself leaning against the bookcase for support.
“But—but—” I stammered. “This is very sudden, Agatha.”
“Yes, Austin, I have come here to tell you that our engagement is
at an end.”
“But surely,” I cried, “you will give me some reason! This is unlike
you, Agatha. Tell me how I have been unfortunate enough to offend
you.”
“It is all over, Austin.”
“But why? You must be under some delusion, Agatha. Perhaps you
have been told some falsehood about me. Or you may have
misunderstood something that I have said to you. Only let me know
what it is, and a word may set it all right.”
“We must consider it all at an end.”
“But you left me last night without a hint at any disagreement.
What could have occurred in the interval to change you so? It must
have been something that happened last night. You have been
thinking it over and you have disapproved of my conduct. Was it the
mesmerism? Did you blame me for letting that woman exercise her
power over you? You know that at the least sign I should have
interfered.”
“It is useless, Austin. All is over:”
Her voice was cold and measured; her manner strangely formal
and hard. It seemed to me that she was absolutely resolved not to
be drawn into any argument or explanation. As for me, I was
shaking with agitation, and I turned my face aside, so ashamed was
I that she should see my want of control.
“You must know what this means to me!” I cried. “It is the blasting
of all my hopes and the ruin of my life! You surely will not inflict such
a punishment upon me unheard. You will let me know what is the
matter. Consider how impossible it would be for me, under any
circumstances, to treat you so. For God’s sake, Agatha, let me know
what I have done!”
She walked past me without a word and opened the door.
“It is quite useless, Austin,” said she. “You must consider our
engagement at an end.” An instant later she was gone, and, before I
could recover myself sufficiently to follow her, I heard the hall-door
close behind her.
I rushed into my room to change my coat, with the idea of
hurrying round to Mrs. Marden’s to learn from her what the cause of
my misfortune might be. So shaken was I that I could hardly lace my
boots. Never shall I forget those horrible ten minutes. I had just
pulled on my overcoat when the clock upon the mantel-piece struck
ten.
Ten! I associated the idea with Miss Penclosa’s note. It was lying
before me on the table, and I tore it open. It was scribbled in pencil
in a peculiarly angular handwriting.
“My Dear Professor Gilroy [it said]: Pray excuse the personal
nature of the test which I am giving you. Professor Wilson
happened to mention the relations between you and my subject
of this evening, and it struck me that nothing could be more
convincing to you than if I were to suggest to Miss Marden that
she should call upon you at half-past nine to-morrow morning
and suspend your engagement for half an hour or so. Science is
so exacting that it is difficult to give a satisfying test, but I am
convinced that this at least will be an action which she would be
most unlikely to do of her own free will. Forget any thing that
she may have said, as she has really nothing whatever to do
with it, and will certainly not recollect any thing about it. I write
this note to shorten your anxiety, and to beg you to forgive me
for the momentary unhappiness which my suggestion must have
caused you.
“Yours faithfully,
“Helen Penclosa.”
Really, when I had read the note, I was too relieved to be angry. It
was a liberty. Certainly it was a very great liberty indeed on the part
of a lady whom I had only met once. But, after all, I had challenged
her by my scepticism. It may have been, as she said, a little difficult
to devise a test which would satisfy me.
And she had done that. There could be no question at all upon the
point. For me hypnotic suggestion was finally established. It took its
place from now onward as one of the facts of life. That Agatha, who
of all women of my acquaintance has the best balanced mind, had
been reduced to a condition of automatism appeared to be certain. A
person at a distance had worked her as an engineer on the shore
might guide a Brennan torpedo.3 A second soul had stepped in, as it
were, had pushed her own aside, and had seized her nervous
mechanism, saying: “I will work this for half an hour.” And Agatha
must have been unconscious as she came and as she returned.
Could she make her way in safety through the streets in such a
state? I put on my hat and hurried round to see if all was well with
her.
Yes. She was at home. I was shown into the drawing-room and
found her sitting with a book upon her lap.
“You are an early visitor, Austin,” said she, smiling.
“And you have been an even earlier one,” I answered.
She looked puzzled. “What do you mean?” she asked.
“You have not been out to-day?”
“No, certainly not.”
“Agatha,” said I seriously, “would you mind telling me exactly what
you have done this morning?”
She laughed at my earnestness.
“You’ve got on your professional look, Austin. See what comes of
being engaged to a man of science. However, I will tell you, though I
can’t imagine what you want to know for. I got up at eight. I
breakfasted at half-past. I came into this room at ten minutes past
nine and began to read the Memoirs of Mme. de Rémusat.4 In a few
minutes I did the French lady the bad compliment of dropping to
sleep over her pages, and I did you, sir, the very flattering one of
dreaming about you. It is only a few minutes since I woke up.”
“And found yourself where you had been before?”
“Why, where else should I find myself?”
“Would you mind telling me, Agatha, what it was that you dreamed
about me? It really is not mere curiosity on my part.”
“I merely had a vague impression that you came into it. I cannot
recall any thing definite.”
“If you have not been out to-day, Agatha, how is it that your shoes
are dusty?”
A pained look came over her face.
“Really, Austin, I do not know what is the matter with you this
morning. One would almost think that you doubted my word. If my
boots are dusty, it must be, of course, that I have put on a pair
which the maid had not cleaned.”
It was perfectly evident that she knew nothing whatever about the
matter, and I reflected that, after all, perhaps it was better that I
should not enlighten her. It might frighten her, and could serve no
good purpose that I could see. I said no more about it, therefore,
and left shortly afterward to give my lecture.
But I am immensely impressed. My horizon of scientific possibilities
has suddenly been enormously extended. I no longer wonder at
Wilson’s demonic energy and enthusiasm. Who would not work hard
who had a vast virgin field ready to his hand? Why, I have known
the novel shape of a nucleolus, or a trifling peculiarity of striped
muscular fibre seen under a 300-diameter lens, fill me with
exultation. How petty do such researches seem when compared with
this one which strikes at the very roots of life and the nature of the
soul! I had always looked upon spirit as a product of matter. The
brain, I thought, secreted the mind, as the liver does the bile. But
how can this be when I see mind working from a distance and
playing upon matter as a musician might upon a violin? The body
does not give rise to the soul, then, but is rather the rough
instrument by which the spirit manifests itself. The windmill does not
give rise to the wind, but only indicates it. It was opposed to my
whole habit of thought, and yet it was undeniably possible and
worthy of investigation.
And why should I not investigate it? I see that under yesterday’s
date I said: “If I could see something positive and objective, I might
be tempted to approach it from the physiological aspect.” Well, I
have got my test. I shall be as good as my word. The investigation
would, I am sure, be of immense interest. Some of my colleagues
might look askance at it, for science is full of unreasoning prejudices,
but if Wilson has the courage of his convictions, I can afford to have
it also. I shall go to him to-morrow morning—to him and to Miss
Penclosa. If she can show us so much, it is probable that she can
show us more.
5 This important work by Alfred Binet and Charles Ferré was first
published in 1888 and surveyed the century-long study of
mesmerism, also known as “animal magnetism.”
6 A medical journal of pathology, established in 1847.
7 A sphygmograph is a device for measuring the rate and strength of
an individual’s pulse.
8 Fellow of the Royal Academy of Science.
Chapter III
I READ over my notes of what the woman said when she spoke
about her powers. There is one point which fills me with dismay. She
implies that when the influence is slight the subject knows what he
is doing, but cannot control himself, whereas when it is strongly
exerted he is absolutely unconscious. Now, I have always known
what I did, though less so last night than on the previous occasions.
That seems to mean that she has never yet exerted her full powers
upon me. Was ever a man so placed before?
Yes, perhaps there was, and very near me, too. Charles Sadler
must know something of this! His vague words of warning take a
meaning now. Oh, if I had only listened to him then, before I helped
by these repeated sittings to forge the links of the chain which binds
me! But I will see him to-day. I will apologise to him for having
treated his warning so lightly. I will see if he can advise me.
4 p.m. No, he cannot. I have talked with him, and he showed such
surprise at the first words in which I tried to express my
unspeakable secret that I went no further. As far as I can gather (by
hints and inferences rather than by any statement), his own
experience was limited to some words or looks such as I have myself
endured. His abandonment of Miss Penclosa is in itself a sign that he
was never really in her toils. Oh, if he only knew his escape! He has
to thank his phlegmatic Saxon temperament for it. I am black and
Celtic,9 and this hag’s clutch is deep in my nerves. Shall I ever get it
out? Shall I ever be the same man that I was just one short fortnight
ago?
Let me consider what I had better do. I cannot leave the university
in the middle of the term. If I were free, my course would be
obvious. I should start at once and travel in Persia. But would she
allow me to start? And could her influence not reach me in Persia,
and bring me back to within touch of her crutch? I can only find out
the limits of this hellish power by my own bitter experience. I will
fight and fight and fight—and what can I do more?
I know very well that about eight o’clock to-night that craving for
her society, that irresistible restlessness, will come upon me. How
shall I overcome it? What shall I do? I must make it impossible for
me to leave the room. I shall lock the door and throw the key out of
the window. But, then, what am I to do in the morning? Never mind
about the morning. I must at all costs break this chain which holds
me.
April 9. Victory! I have done splendidly! At seven o’clock last night
I took a hasty dinner, and then locked myself up in my bedroom and
dropped the key into the garden. I chose a cheery novel, and lay in
bed for three hours trying to read it, but really in a horrible state of
trepidation, expecting every instant that I should become conscious
of the impulse. Nothing of the sort occurred, however, and I awoke
this morning with the feeling that a black nightmare had been lifted
off me. Perhaps the creature realized what I had done, and
understood that it was useless to try to influence me. At any rate, I
have beaten her once, and if I can do it once, I can do it again.
It was most awkward about the key in the morning. Luckily, there
was an under-gardener below, and I asked him to throw it up. No
doubt he thought I had just dropped it. I will have doors and
windows screwed up and six stout men to hold me down in my bed
before I will surrender myself to be hag-ridden in this way.
I had a note from Mrs. Marden this afternoon asking me to go
round and see her. I intended to do so in any case, but had not
excepted to find bad news waiting for me. It seems that the
Armstrongs, from whom Agatha has expectations, are due home
from Adelaide in the Aurora, and that they have written to Mrs.
Marden and her to meet them in town. They will probably be away
for a month or six weeks, and, as the Aurora is due on Wednesday,
they must go at once—to-morrow, if they are ready in time. My
consolation is that when we meet again there will be no more
parting between Agatha and me.
“I want you to do one thing, Agatha,” said I, when we were alone
together. “If you should happen to meet Miss Penclosa, either in
town or here, you must promise me never again to allow her to
mesmerize you.”
Agatha opened her eyes.
“Why, it was only the other day that you were saying how
interesting it all was, and how determined you were to finish your
experiments.”
“I know, but I have changed my mind since then.”
“And you won’t have it any more?”
“No.”
“I am so glad, Austin. You can’t think how pale and worn you have
been lately. It was really our principal objection to going to London
now that we did not wish to leave you when you were so pulled
down. And your manner has been so strange occasionally—
especially that night when you left poor Professor Pratt-Haldane to
play dummy. I am convinced that these experiments are very bad for
your nerves.”
“I think so, too, dear.”
“And for Miss Penclosa’s nerves as well. You have heard that she is
ill?”
“No.”
“Mrs. Wilson told us so last night. She described it as a nervous
fever. Professor Wilson is coming back this week, and of course Mrs.
Wilson is very anxious that Miss Penclosa should be well again then,
for he has quite a programme of experiments which he is anxious to
carry out.”
I was glad to have Agatha’s promise, for it was enough that this
woman should have one of us in her clutch. On the other hand, I
was disturbed to hear about Miss Penclosa’s illness. It rather
discounts the victory which I appeared to win last night. I remember
that she said that loss of health interfered with her power. That may
be why I was able to hold my own so easily. Well, well, I must take
the same precautions to-night and see what comes of it. I am
childishly frightened when I think of her.
April 10. All went very well last night. I was amused at the
gardener’s face when I had again to hail him this morning and to ask
him to throw up my key. I shall get a name among the servants if
this sort of thing goes on. But the great point is that I stayed in my
room without the slightest inclination to leave it. I do believe that I
am shaking myself clear of this incredible bond—or is it only that the
woman’s power is in abeyance until she recovers her strength? I can
but pray for the best.
The Mardens left this morning, and the brightness seems to have
gone out of the spring sunshine. And yet it is very beautiful also as it
gleams on the green chestnuts opposite my windows, and gives a
touch of gayety to the heavy, lichen-mottled walls of the old
colleges. How sweet and gentle and soothing is Nature! Who would
think that there lurked in her also such vile forces, such odious
possibilities! For of course I understand that this dreadful thing
which has sprung out at me is neither supernatural nor even
preternatural. No, it is a natural force which this woman can use and
society is ignorant of. The mere fact that it ebbs with her strength
shows how entirely it is subject to physical laws. If I had time, I
might probe it to the bottom and lay my hands upon its antidote.
But you cannot tame the tiger when you are beneath his claws. You
can but try to writhe away from him. Ah, when I look in the glass
and see my own dark eyes and clear-cut Spanish face, I long for a
vitriol splash or a bout of the small-pox. One or the other might have
saved me from this calamity.
I am inclined to think that I may have trouble to-night. There are
two things which make me fear so. One is that I met Mrs. Wilson in
the street, and that she tells me that Miss Penclosa is better, though
still weak. I find myself wishing in my heart that the illness had been
her last. The other is that Professor Wilson comes back in a day or
two, and his presence would act as a constraint upon her. I should
not fear our interviews if a third person were present. For both these
reasons I have a presentiment of trouble to-night, and I shall take
the same precautions as before.
April 10. No, thank God, all went well last night. I really could not
face the gardener again. I locked my door and thrust the key
underneath it, so that I had to ask the maid to let me out in the
morning. But the precaution was really not needed, for I never had
any inclination to go out at all. Three evenings in succession at
home! I am surely near the end of my troubles, for Wilson will be
home again either to-day or to-morrow. Shall I tell him of what I
have gone through or not? I am convinced that I should not have
the slightest sympathy from him. He would look upon me as an
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In the grottoes within the Caucasian icy mountains, which the bold
glance of mortal has never spied, where the frost creates an eternal
translucent vault and dulls the fall of the sun’s rays, where lightning
is dead, where thunder is fettered, there stands, cut into ice, a
mighty mansion. There are the storms, there are the cold, blizzards,
tempests; there Winter reigns, devouring years. This austere sister
of other days, though hoary, is swift and agile. Rival of Spring,
Autumn and Summer, she is clad in the purple woven of snow; stark-
frozen steam serves her as veil. Her throne has the form of a
diamond mountain. Great pillars, of ice constructed, cast a silvery
sheen, illumined by the sun; over the heavenly vault glides the solar
splendour, and then it seems a mass of ice is on fire.
The elements have no motion: the air dares not move, nor the fire
glow. There are no coloured fields; among the fields of ice gleam
only frozen flowery vapours; the waters in the heavens, melted by
the rays, hang, petrified, in wavy layers; there in the air you may
discern the words of prophecy, but all is stark, and nature dead. Only
tremor, chill and frost have life; hoar frosts move about, while
zephyrs grow dumb; snowstorms whirl about in flight, frosts reign in
the place of summer luxury. There the ice represents the ruins of
cities, one look at which congeals your blood. Pressed by the frosts,
the snows there form silvery mounds and fields of diamonds. From
there Winter spreads her dominion over us, devouring the grass in
the fields, the flowers in the vales, and sucking up the living sap of
trees, and on cold pinions bears frosts to us, driving day away,
prolonging gloomy nights, and compelling the sun to turn aside his
beaming eyes: with trembling, forests and rivers await her, and chills
weave her shrouds from the white billows.
Platón (in civil life Peter Geórgevich) Levshín.
(1737-1812.)
What Feofán Prokopóvich had been to the reign of Peter
the Great, Platón was to Catherine II. After having studied in
the Moscow Theological Academy, where he became a
teacher even before ending his course, he took the tonsure at
twenty-two; at twenty-five he was made rector of the
Seminary. In the same year he attracted Catherine’s attention
by an eloquent speech On the Usefulness of Piety, and he
was at once called to St. Petersburg to be her son’s spiritual
teacher (see p. 326). Platón rose rapidly, and in 1787 he was
made metropolitan of Moscow. His liberal and enlightened
views on theology were valued not only at home, but his Brief
Theology, originally published in 1755, has been translated
into most European languages, and three times into English.
A Russian source informs us that his book on theology was
made a text-book at Oxford and Cambridge. Several
Englishmen who had visited him, and Dr. Stanley, spoke in
the highest terms of this Russian divine.
The translation of his Brief Theology in English bears the
following titles: The Present State of the Greek Church in
Russia; or, A Summary of Christian Divinity, by Platón, Late
Metropolitan of Moscow, translated from the Slavonian ... by
Robert Pinkerton, Edinburgh, 1814, and New York, 1815; The
Orthodox Doctrine of the Apostolic Eastern Church; or, A
Compendium of Christian Theology, translated from the
Greek ... to which is appended a Treatise on Melchisedec,
London, Manchester [printed], 1857; Κατηχησις—The Great
Catechism of the Holy Catholic Apostolic and Orthodox
Church, translated from the Greek by J. T. S., London, 1867.
A Sermon preached by order of Her Imperial Majesty, on the
Tomb of Peter the Great, in the Cathedral Church of St.
Petersburg, London, 1770.
WHAT ARE IDOLATERS?
THE METAPHYSICIAN
A father had heard that children were sent beyond the sea to
study, and that those who had been abroad are invariably preferred
to those who had never been there, and that such people are
respected as being possessed of wisdom. Seeing this, he decided to
send his son also beyond the sea, for he was rich and did not wish to
fall behind the others.
His son learned something, but, being stupid, returned more stupid
yet. He had fallen into the hands of scholastic prevaricators who
more than once have deprived people of their senses by giving
explanations of inexplicable things; they taught him no whit, and sent
him home a fool for ever. Formerly he used to utter simply stupid
things, but now he gave them a scientific turn. Formerly fools only
could not understand him, but now even wise men could not grasp
him: his home, the city, the whole world, was tired of his chattering.
Once, raving in a metaphysical meditation over an old proposition
to find the first cause of all things,—while he was soaring in the
clouds in thought,—he walked off the road and fell into a ditch. His
father, who happened to be with him, hastened to bring a rope, in
order to save the precious wisdom of his house. In the meantime his
wise offspring sat in the ditch and meditated: “What can be the
cause of my fall? The cause of my stumbling,” the wiseacre
concluded, “is an earthquake. And the precipitous tendency towards
the ditch may have been produced by an aërial pressure, and a
coactive interrelation of the seven planets and the earth and ditch.”...
His father arrived with the rope: “Here,” he said, “is a rope for you!
Take hold of it, and I will pull you out. Hold on to it and do not let it
slip!” “No, don’t pull yet: tell me first what kind of a thing is a rope?”
His father was not a learned man, but he had his wits about him,
so, leaving his foolish question alone, he said: “A rope is a thing with
which to pull people out of ditches into which they have fallen.” “Why
have they not invented a machine for that? A rope is too simple a
thing.” “’T would take time for that,” his father replied, “whereas your
salvation is now at hand.” “Time? What kind of a thing is time?”
“Time is a thing that I am not going to waste with a fool. Stay there,”
his father said, “until I shall return!”
How would it be if all the other verbose talkers were collected and
put in the ditch to serve him as companions? Well, it would take a
much larger ditch for that.
Yákov Borísovich Knyazhnín. (1742-1791.)
Knyazhnín was born in Pskov, where he received his early
education; in St. Petersburg he acquired German, French and
Italian, and began to write verses. He served in civil and
military government offices. In 1769 he wrote his first tragedy,
Dido, which attracted Catherine’s attention to him. He then
married Sumarókov’s daughter and devoted himself more
especially to literature. Knyazhnín wrote a number of
tragedies and comedies: the subject of all of these is taken
from Italian and French, thus his Vadím of Nóvgorod is based
on Metastasio’s Clemenza di Tito, and the original of Odd
People is Destouches’s L’homme singulier. The Vadím of
Nóvgorod had a peculiar history. Knyazhnín had great
admiration for Catherine and her autocratic rule. In his Vadím
he tried to depict the struggle between republican Nóvgorod
and the monarchic Rúrik, in which the latter comes out
victorious, to the advantage of unruly Nóvgorod. He had
written it in 1789, but did not stage it on account of the
disturbed condition of Europe under the incipient French
Revolution. Two years after his death, in 1793, Princess
Dáshkov, the President of the Academy, inadvertently ordered
it to be published. The book appeared most inopportunely, at
the very time the Revolution had broken forth. The tendency
of the tragedy was overlooked, and only the republican
utterances of Vadím were taken notice of. The book was
ordered to be burnt by the executioner, but as only a few
copies could be found in the storeroom of the Academy, the
rest having been sold in the meanwhile, they were privately
destroyed.
VADÍM OF NÓVGOROD
ODD PEOPLE